


Alpha Shift

by Aevintyr



Series: Not Meant For Paradise [3]
Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Established Relationship, Five Year Mission, M/M, Medical Procedures
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-30
Updated: 2020-11-30
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:27:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27801526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aevintyr/pseuds/Aevintyr
Summary: A day in the life of Tom Krejci (current assignment: Head Nurse, Medical Department, USS Enterprise).
Relationships: James T. Kirk/Leonard "Bones" McCoy
Series: Not Meant For Paradise [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1769527
Comments: 12
Kudos: 60





	Alpha Shift

0730 hours. You always arrive in medbay half an hour early. You don’t have to, strictly speaking, but you like having everything prepared by the time alpha shift rolls around.

“Hello, ma’am,” you greet Dr Victoria Sanchez, the gamma shift doctor.

“Good morning, Krejci. No major incidents.” She indicates the single occupied biobed. “One overnight. Technician Rudinov from Engineering. Plasma burn, 2nd degree. Dermal took care of it.”

“Thank you, ma’am.” 

Rudinov is still asleep. You check his vitals and call up his chart on your padd. Everything looks fine, but discharging overnights is the prerogative of the alpha shift doctor, usually the Chief Medical Officer. Aboard the USS Enterprise, that’s Dr Leonard McCoy.

You walk over to the Head Nurse’s station, call up today’s schedule and add the plasma burn to the top. Is it your imagination or have plasma burns increased recently? You cross-reference with medbay’s records - there is indeed a marked increase across all three shifts - and compile a short report of the relevant data just in case.

0745 hours. “Hey, Tom?” Elayne Jeren, one of the gamma techs, leans over your station. “I have my physical due one of these days, right? Think you can bump me up to alpha today?”

“This wouldn’t have anything to do with today being a CAP day, would it?” 

Work on the _Comparative Alien Physiology_ database is continuous, as it is one of the - if not _the_ \- most important projects of the Medical department. Dr McCoy checks up on the overall progress every seven days. More frequently when there’s been a new First Contact, but it’s been a while (forty-two days, to be precise).

Jeren bats her eyelashes. “Pretty please?”

“No can do.” 

“But —”

“I have your report right here. I’ll make sure Dr McCoy sees it.”

She pulls a face. “Jeez, thanks mate.”

You could, of course, easily shift her physical to a time today that would likely result in her being in medbay when Dr McCoy will go over the database. But then, every crewmember has to have a physical once every quarter and your schedule does not discriminate. You cannot show any favoritism towards Medical staff. Word would get around, and then _everyone_ would badger you about shifting their schedule this way or that. Worse, Dr McCoy would find out. 

“Sorry. You know I can’t.”

“Yeah, fine, whatever.” Jeren strides off. 

You sigh, and pull up her report as a gesture of good will, routinely deleting exclamation marks as you read. 

0755 hours. You double check that no medbay or medlab station from beta and gamma shift is missing from the logs while Pat Aiello, the head gamma nurse, gets the coffee going. It’s always the last duty of any shift to make coffee for the next. You could just get it from the replicator, of course, but Dr McCoy hates replicated coffee. 

With all the logs confirmed on the system, you scroll down the list of on-going research projects and try to decide how much more there might be time for in between the scheduled physicals and the CAP review. If all stays quiet, you might be able to send some of the nurses to do the not-quite-overdue routine health and safety check in the phaser control room. After that, it’s the turn of cargo bay, which always takes at least half a shift to complete, and after that, it’s time for a full-ship emergency evacuation drill, which requires all of alpha and gamma shift to run, so it would be good to get ahead while you can.

However, the main question for today’s schedule is the same as always, and it never has an answer: will it be a normal day, or will all hell break loose?

0800 hours. The rest of alpha shift starts coming in while you check with Records if there are any up-coming temporary assignments to the USS Enterprise who would need to have their medical records approved by Dr McCoy, but there are none to be expected.

You look up and tell the alpha technicians, Karen Tracy and Clifford Brent, “Good morning. Your priorities for today’s schedule?”

Tracy shrugs. “We still have this sedative thing for SMJ, right?” _Starfleet Medical Journal_ , aka The Bane Of Your Existence. “Medlab beta or gamma get anywhere with the melorazine?”

You shake your head. “Today’s a CAP day.”

“Ah, shoot, of course it is. Can we submit it without the melorazine, do you think?”

“Dr M’Benga was adamant it will work on Vulcans.”

“I’ll ask Marina.” As in Marina Hakim, the head lab technician. “Maybe she can give it a look today.”

“That’d be great.” You check back with the schedule. “Hey, just to confirm, you’ve put in for another two psych tricorder sessions today? You want a review with Dr McCoy, too?”

“Not yet.” Tracy shifts on her feet. “I just don’t have enough new data for that to make sense.”

Dr McCoy lets the technicians run their individual research projects whenever they like, however they like. And yet, sometimes, outside interest intervenes.

“You got this memo from Psych, too?” you ask, carefully. It’s the seventh one in fifteen days.

“I did.” She sighs. “I keep trying to tell them there’s no way to rush these studies, but …”

“You do realize Dr McCoy will back you up against Psych, right?” 

Tracy looks away. “I don’t want to _bother_ him.”

He will be annoyed to have to waste time on Psych, yes, but you can always rely on Dr McCoy to back up his staff, against anyone. Even Captain Kirk. 

“Hang on,” Brent speaks up, “you mean you’re actively depriving us of the chance to watch Dr McCoy lecture someone high up at Psych about _the value of proper medical research, which takes time, goddamnit_? Where are your priorities?”

Tracy … laughs. “Well, if you put it like that …”

The notion makes you laugh, too. It _is_ entertaining, watching Dr McCoy chew someone out, as long as it’s not you. If it is you (it rarely is, but if), his full-blown fury laced with a crescendo of Southern accent always makes you feel like a clueless schoolboy (except that schoolboy would never have dreamed of going to space, let alone on the flagship of Starfleet). 

The trick, when he _is_ yelling at you, is not to take it as a sign of personal dislike. Dr McCoy yells at everyone. Even Captain Kirk.

Still, it’s hard. You don’t want him to be disappointed in you.

0815 hours. On a normal day, this is usually the time the doors of medbay open again and Dr McCoy comes in from alpha briefing on the bridge, always (not usually, _always_ ) in a bad mood and in dire need of coffee. 

Today, the intercom whistles. This does not guarantee that all hell will break loose, but it increases the odds significantly. 

“McCoy to medbay,” a familiar drawl sounds from the intercom.

It’s officially alpha shift, which means it is your job to answer. “Krejci here, sir.”

“Anyone dyin’ in medbay right now?”

You almost smile. “No, sir.”

“Fantastic. Gamma shift dismissed. I’ll be there as soon as I can. McCoy out.”

Dr Sanchez sends you her personal shift report and clears out with the rest of gamma shift, including a still grumbling Jeren. 

You sit down and call up your own report from yesterday’s alpha shift to add anything flagged in the remaining physicals ( _Technician Jasič, Operations, impulse engineering, beta: flag from prior exposure to toxic substance - all parameters normal_ ). You frown at the Hb count of Specialist Min ( _Operations, damage control, beta_ ), which isn’t flagged as 11.6 is within normal parameters (barely), but if you recall correctly, it’s been dropping steadily over the past months. You check to confirm, and flag it for the next physical. 

Next, you cross-reference the spontaneous visits to medbay, the usual lot of sprained limbs and common colds, and note that the routine CBC of Ensign Harper ( _Operations, communications, gamma_ ) due to his newly implanted liver checks out fine. 

What you end up is a neatly compiled report of anything that happened in medbay during the last twenty-four hours.

You don’t, strictly speaking, have to compile anything. Strictly speaking, the Chief Medical Officer should have a personal yeoman. But he doesn’t (due to staff shortages). So you do it instead.

0825 hours. Dr McCoy arrives, in a particularly foul mood. This usually means that Captain Kirk is (or will be) giving orders that Dr McCoy does not approve of. Armed with a padd and a cup of coffee, you make your way towards the door. “Good morning, sir.”

Dr McCoy scans the schedule between deep swallows of coffee. “Another plasma burn?” 

“Yes, sir. There has in fact been a 32.4% increase in the past thirty days. Report attached.”

It’s been a _long_ time since you were caught not anticipating what Dr McCoy might need on hand. He takes you for granted by now, and you take that as a compliment. Maybe you shouldn’t, but …

The thing is, you have been a tiny bit in love with Dr McCoy from the moment you were assigned to his command aboard the Enterprise. 

Of course, everyone in Medical is a tiny bit in love with Dr McCoy. Professionally. Everyone lives for a rare _good job y’all_. But not everyone, you think, lives for the rare occasions where you’ve made him laugh, and feeds on them for weeks. Not everyone thinks about —

Never mind.

0830 hours. Time to wake up and discharge Rudinov.

Brent runs the tricorder while Dr McCoy stands by to supervise. He’ll be teaching at Starfleet Medical one day, you’re sure of it. 

“4-0, sir,” Brent concludes. 

“Hm.” Dr McCoy leans down and takes Rudinov’s wrist in his left hand, while he runs his right hand up the arm, over the newly regenerated skin. It’s the way he does things, which no one in the Technical Services Academy ever taught you: with his hands. 

(The very first training sim he ever ran alpha shift through, back before you’d left Earth, was to see whether you could set a broken bone with your hands. You couldn’t. No one could, not even Tracy. Back then, that is.)

He will always consult a tricorder and the biobed monitors, of course, but it’s a rare patient that gets discharged from medbay without Dr McCoy touching them at least once. You remember he assessed your sprained wrist with his hands, too, in the terrible ion storm. You remember that very well indeed. 

“Any pain? Discomfort?”

“No, sir,” Rudinov stammers. 

Dr McCoy glares. 

“It’s, uh … a little tender, sir,” Rudinov admits. “But it doesn’t hurt, sir, not at all.”

“Huh.” Dr McCoy runs his hand over the tender skin once more, then puts Rudinov’s arm down on the biobed. “Alright, you’re cleared for duty. If it’s still tender tomorrow, you report back here.”

“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”

Rudinov shuffles off the bed, and out of medbay. You call up his medical records on your padd and mark the plasma burn as discharged, together with the recommendation concerning a possible follow-up.

When you look for Dr McCoy to sign his confirmation onto the padd, he has already walked over to his station, and you hurry to join him. He slams on the intercom. “McCoy to Scott!” 

“Aye, Scotty here! What’s up, doc?” 

Lieutenant Commander Montgomery Scott, the Chief Engineering Officer, is one of the few people aboard the Enterprise who don’t cower in terror at being commed out of the blue by Dr McCoy.

“Explain to me why we’ve seen a 32.4% increase in plasma burns from Engineerin’ in medbay these past thirty days?”

It might not be obvious to everyone, but this is Dr McCoy being considerate. He could, after all, have commed Records instead, to personally investigate any recent personnel or equipment changes or other oddities in Engineering. Or he could have gone straight to Captain Kirk. 

“Er …” Lieutenant Commander Scott pauses. “Actually, I canna explain that, doc. Not yet, anyways. But you can rest assured that I’m going ter find out!”

“I’ll _rest assured_ when those plasma burns drop! McCoy out.” He flicks off the intercom. “Krejci, schedule a check-in, recurrin’ daily, until they sort it out down there.”

“Yes, sir.” You were already typing this into your padd.

Dr McCoy gulps down the rest of his coffee, then looks at you. “Good catch.”

Your heart skips a beat. “Th—thank you, sir.”

0900 hours. The first physical of the day arrives in the person of Technician Jenny Mears ( _Operations, shuttlebay_ ). 

If the Enterprise had a strict and balanced schedule, you would have to put in 1.5 physicals per shift per day. Since nothing on the Enterprise ever adheres to any schedule (at least, not for long), you put in at least four per shift per day, and six for alpha, which has the most crew. Special attention needs to be paid to staff officers, since those are under the personal care of the Chief Medical Officer. Everyone else, by now the nurses handle it themselves with medlab, unless there is a real problem. 

Mears, despite being on the shuttlebay crew (24.9% more prone to injury than the average crewmember, almost as bad as cargo bay), does not have any problems. You keep an eye on Burke running the physical, while you read over the paper for SMJ and fix the citation style where Dr M’Benga has messed it up again, or rather, where he used last month’s citation style. It’s a simple mistake to make considering the rate SMJ keeps changing their stylesheet.

“That the sedative thing?” You jump at the sound of Dr McCoy’s voice.

“Yes, sir. We’re still waiting on the melorazine results.”

“Brent!” 

“Yes, sir.” 

“Get over to medlab and get on the melorazine with Hakim. I don’t care if it takes all shift!” 

“Right away, sir.”

Brent leaves.

Dr McCoy remains standing by your station, and pinches the bridge of his nose. 

Eventually, you manage, “Sir?”

He exhales. “Where are we with CAP?”

“I have a report from Jeren right here, sir.”

He looks over to the Technicians’ station. “Tracy! CAP report, now!”

“Yes, sir.” Tracy hurries over. “We’ve made some progress with the Kazarite nervous system. Well, it was mostly Jeren, to be honest.”

Dr McCoy holds out his hand. You put the padd with Jeren’s report into it. He takes it, and starts to read.

0933 hours. “Yellow alert,” the voice of Ensign Chekov, the Chief Navigator, sounds from the intercom. “Be advised that there is a contained radiation leak in geology. The situation is under control. Stand by for precautionary ship-wide decontamination sweep. I repeat, situation is under control.”

“Damnit!” Dr McCoy stalks over to the door. Is this related to his foul mood earlier? 

On cue, the doors of medbay slide open and in comes Commander Spock, with an unconscious woman in his arms. 

“Put her here,” Dr McCoy snaps. 

You rush to his side, crash kit in hand, Tracy on your heels. 

“It appears the soil contained a severe level of radiation after all,” Commander Spock is saying.

“No kiddin’!” Dr McCoy feels for the carotid pulse with his hand (the blaring biobed monitor says heart rate is 33 and dropping), then checks the airways and neurological response. You recognize the patient as Lieutenant Arlene Galway ( _Science, geology_ ). 

“The entire geology department has been decontaminated and flushed with hyronalin, Doctor,” Commander Spock says. “Lieutenant Galway is the only crewmember who has exhibited any symptoms at all.”

She’s not just _exhibiting symptoms_. She’s crashing. 

Dr McCoy orders, “Krejci, tri-ox pump! Tracy, ciranine, 5 ccs!”

Out of the corner of your eye, as you set up the pump, you can see Commander Spock stand up straighter. Ciranine is the radiation treatment whose formula Dr McCoy developed himself (you are certain it would be unwise to ask how). It’s effective, even if it is harsh on the body. Only to be used as a last resort.

The intercom whistles. “Kirk to medbay —”

“Not now!” 

Dr McCoy administers the hypo. Lieutenant Galway’s heart rate spikes and she jerks awake, gasping for air. You reach for a kidney bowl.

“It’s alright, Lieutenant.” Dr McCoy guides her into a sitting position and takes the bowl from you. He doesn’t let go of her as she starts to retch. “Shhh, it’s alright, you’re going to be alright.”

This soft, soothing tone is something he reserves for people who have become casualties of space through no fault of their own. You don’t hear it often.

Lieutenant Galway is retching up her breakfast. But no blood, as far as you can see. Dr McCoy will still want it tested. He always wants _everything_ tested, just in case.

You elbow Tracy and mouth, _sample_. Tracy nods. You check the tri-ox pump. Thankfully, it hasn’t been dislocated.

Eventually, Lieutenant Galway slumps against Dr McCoy.

He hands the bowl to Tracy, who takes it away.

Burke comes to stand by your side with a damp cloth and some mouthwash. Usually, this would be a nurse’s task, but you pass everything along to Dr McCoy, who indeed takes care of Lieutenant Galway himself. 

You could listen to him soothe patients all day, every day.

When Lieutenant Galway is lying down on the bed again, Dr McCoy turns to you. “Axonol, 2 ccs.”

You haven’t had time to guess which sedative he’d request. He’s not mad. He just nods as you hand him the hypo.

To Lieutenant Galway, he says, “I’m gonna give you somethin’ to help you sleep now, alright?” She barely notices the hypo. He feels for the carotid pulse again, then checks over the flow of the tri-ox pump, and lastly the vitals on the monitor. They’re stable. Weak, yes, but stable.

When Dr McCoy finally turns to Commander Spock, the look on his face would make anyone run for the hills. “ _Explain_.”

Commander Spock doesn’t run. He merely arches an eyebrow. “Lieutenant Galway opened the secure container with the soil sample according to every health and safety precaution, in an isolation chamber, wearing a hazmat suit. The soil sample reacted adversely to this environment, in such a way that the hazmat suit offered insufficient protection. As I am certain you will recall from alpha briefing, there was no indication in the surface scans that could have anticipated a radiation level so severe.”

“You really wanna keep tellin’ me that no one could have _anticipated_ that the soil of a planet with _no life forms whatsoever_ might be _dangerous_?” Dr McCoy yells.

“Nevertheless,” Commander Spock says, unperturbed, “the traces of dilithium required an investigation, and as I have pointed out on multiple occasions now, there was no —”

“ _I don’t care_!” Dr McCoy stalks off towards his station.

Commander Spock arches an eyebrow at you, like he expects you to agree with him. 

Generally, you have an enormous amount of respect for Commander Spock, for the way he remains utterly calm no matter the situation. You have never heard him raise his voice. Not once. 

Currently, the situation sounds like a classic case of scientific benefit versus medical risk. If there is dilithium involved, and the scans do not indicate abnormal levels of radiation, scientific benefit wins out. It is correct that no one could have anticipated a soil sample in a container opened in an isolation chamber by a crewmember in a hazmat suit would almost kill that crewmember.

Objectively, you would have to side with Commander Spock here. 

But you can’t - or rather, you won’t. 

Meanwhile, the intercom has whistled into life. “McCoy to Captain Kirk.”

“Kirk here.” The Captain does sound … a little desperate.

“She’s alive.” Dr McCoy flips to another intercom channel without giving him a chance to reply, which breaches so many Starfleet Regulations you won’t even start to count, but it’s not like Captain Kirk will put in a complaint.

“McCoy to Records.” 

“Rand here, sir.” Ensign Janice Rand, the Chief Records Officer, is another crewmember who won’t cower in terror. Nothing in this entire quadrant could make her cower. 

“I need a list of every crewmember that got to within five meters of that soil sample, transporter room, geology, the lot. Have everyone report to medbay now. I mean _everybody_. And I mean _now_!”

“Yes, sir.”

There goes the rest of your shift. You grab your padd, and cancel physicals up to and inclduing alpha tomorrow. Next, you set up the report for all the potential cases of radiation poisoning that will start arriving in medbay any moment now. You send a message to Brent, asking him to return to medbay.

“Doctor,” Commander Spock says, “Lieutenant Galway was the only one directly exposed to—”

“Shut the hell up or I’ll have you restrained for obstructin’ a medical emergency!” Dr McCoy whirls around to you. “Krejci! Cancel today’s physicals, set up the report, and get Brent back over here. Then start testin’ with Commander Spock right here. Full radiation exposure protocol. Move!”

All around him, medbay jumps into action.

You clear your throat. “Commander? Would you follow me, please?”

He does.

1200 hours. Lunch break, as such, does not exist in medbay. Usually, you eat what you can, when you can. Today, you can’t. Instead, you take the next blood sample for Brent to test.

1315 hours. All forty-seven crewembers who have come to within five meters of the soil sample have been tested according to the full radiation exposure protocol. No one apart from Lieutenant Galway presented with any signs of radiation poisoning. You, along with everyone else in medbay, exhale a sigh of relief. 

Everyone, that is, except Dr McCoy. He orders the crewmembers to be discharged with a flag in their medical records to re-check for potential radiation damage during their next physicals, then walks back to Lieutenant Galway’s bed and scowls at her vitals. They don’t change.

1325 hours. Ensign Malay ( _Operations, security team three_ ) comes in, as you half expected. Whenever there is a precautionary ship-wide measure, you get some or all of the usual suspects. Beta shift will be especially busy when people find out exactly what happened while they were asleep.

“What’s wrong, Ensign?” Dr McCoy asks. 

“I, uhm … I just feel a bit nauseous, sir.”

Usually, Dr McCoy would at least comment on the unlikeliness of Ensign Malay having been exposed. Today, he just heaves a sigh. “Tracy, run standard tests.”

1355 hours. Lieutenant Galway’s vitals have remained stable-but-weak for half an hour now despite Dr McCoy’s intent glare. 

Ensign Malay was 4-0 as expected, all medical records have been updated, and there are no patients left in medbay except Lieutenant Galway. Whenever there’s a major incident, the other cases of sprained limbs, etc., hold off on coming in. It’s why you’ve cancelled physicals for more than just this shift. Alpha tomorrow will be busy, too. And Dr McCoy will be _furious_ with anyone who has waited a whole rotation to see him.

Right now, he isn’t furious. He just looks around the empty medbay, and the assorted alpha shift. “Y’all go drink some water. Sit down. Eat somethin’. Go.”

You’re not really hungry, but you know better than to disobey. So you get some granola bars and a glass of water from medbay’s replicator and follow the others into one of the private medbay rooms you use as a makeshift break room. No one speaks. It’s always like this, when someone almost dies on your shift.

1405 hours. You leave the break room, walk back to the replicator and request another glass of water ( _light mint flavor_ ). Armed with this glass, you approach Lieutenant Galway’s biobed, where Dr McCoy is still standing, watching her vitals, arms folded across his chest.

You clear your throat, and hold out the glass.

Dr McCoy closes his eyes, briefly, like he’s about to yell at you, but then, he doesn’t. He just takes the glass and drinks.

1410 hours. No one else has come in seeking medical help. Tracy has gone off to do her psych tricorder sessions in one of the private rooms. Brent is back on the melorazine with medlab.

“Krejci,” Dr McCoy says. “Let’s run some drills, shall we?”

You call up the programme you wrote that picks a drill at random and hand the padd to him without looking at it. He nods. “Nurses!”

Everyone gathers round while Dr McCoy runs you through a mystery patient, where you have to guess the diagnosis by asking questions or by requesting certain tests. 

You’ve offered, once, to look into writing an entire programme for this, but Dr McCoy declined. Instead, whenever he’s running this drill, he makes up patients, symptoms and lab results on the fly. After several months, you have to concede that no computer programme could ever reach as deeply into the calamities of disease and despair as Dr McCoy can in his mind. If you think too long about what that _says_ about his mind, you start to worry about him.

So instead of thinking about that, you deduce correctly that the mystery patient’s high metabolic rate is nothing to worry about as she is Andorian, but that the sore throat is a sign of chronic tonsillitis, which this species is prone to. You furthermore point out that one should not administer nonsteriodal anti-inflammatories to protect the sensitive kidneys, and that the best long-term curative option for this Andorian would be a tonsillectomy.

“And in case of cervical lymphadenopathy?” Dr McCoy asks.

You think for a split-second, then add, “Possible infectious mononucleosis. Run CBC for atypical lymphocytes. In Andorians, anything over 6.7.”

“Exactly.” He … almost smiles. It makes your day. “Alright, now for the rest of you …”

1435 hours. One of your all-time favorite and yet least favorite things on the Enterprise happens: Captain Kirk walks into medbay. 

“Dr McCoy?” 

“Yes, Captain.” 

It is a bit ridiculous that they insist on this formal address when everyone knows that they … well. 

Captain Kirk walks over to the biobed where Lieutenant Galway is sleeping. Dr McCoy comes to stand on her other side.

“So she’s …” Captain Kirk frowns at her vitals.

“Recoverin’.”

“And did you —”

“She would’ve died.”

It seems this somewhat cryptic exchange conveys all the information Captain Kirk has been looking for, because he nods, then clears his throat. “Are you, uhm, are you terribly busy right now?”

“Oh, no, not _terribly_. I’m merely tryin’ to keep four hundred plus people alive in the lethal dangers of space but otherwise I’m not busy _at all_. Sir.”

Dr McCoy only calls Captain Kirk _sir_ when he’s mad at him. It feels intrusive for you to know that.

“Look, it was a risk, yeah, okay, but we _had_ to check for dilithium.”

When he’s not mad (or not too mad), Dr McCoy calls Captain Kirk _Jim_. 

Right now, though, he doesn’t say anything. 

You can’t help but wonder what they’re like when they’re alone with each other. You and the rest of the Enterprise. They don’t let on much, when they’re on duty. 

There was a guy on temporary assignment once (it’s always the temps), who asked about Captain Kirk’s notorious string of affairs. Elayne Jeren said, “Give me a heads-up if you ever plan to ask that where Dr McCoy can hear, someone has got to record it, as a warning for posterity.”

Everyone laughed, but you don’t think Dr McCoy would have been all that mad. Not about the affairs, anyway. 

“Krejci!” 

You jump to your feet. “Yes, sir.”

“Where’s my report on the melorazine?”

Medlab hasn’t sent you anything yet, not even a preliminary report. As Dr McCoy knows full well, because medlab was busy running tests for radiation poisoning, and because you would have forwarded any report to him immediately. This isn’t about melorazine. You take the next-best padd (shift reports), walk over to the biobed, and hand it to him.

“Right here, sir.”

Dr McCoy grabs the padd like a lifeline.

“Come on, Bones.” 

Captain Kirk is the only person who calls Dr McCoy _Bones_. 

“Krejci,” Dr McCoy says, off-hand, “enlighten the Captain as to the medical relevance of melorazine?”

You do your best not to flinch away from Captain Kirk’s intense (and annoyed) gaze. You have your orders. “It’s a sedative, Captain. A rapid-acting sedative that might be efficient for several species resistant to most known sedatives, such as Vulcans and —”

“Exactly.” Dr McCoy doesn’t look up from the not-yet-existent report. “That sound unimportant to you, _sir_?”

“ _Okay_. As you were, then.”

Dr McCoy rolls his eyes. Captain Kirk turns on his heel and leaves.

This isn’t the first time you’ve witnessed them … disagree. You wouldn’t go as far as say _fight_. That would imply a personal matter. This is a professional disagreement. But it probably still hurts. 

“Krejci.”

You can’t help but wince as you turn back to Dr McCoy. “Yes, sir.”

“What do you think about the melorazine?”

You frown. “What do I think … medically?”

He rolls his eyes. “No, microtypographically.” Wait, so he has noticed that you’ve been fixing the citations? “Well?”

“Uhm …” It’s not your place, as a nurse, to comment on any medical research the doctors undertake, assisted by the technicians. But if Dr McCoy asks you a question, you better answer. “Of course we won’t know until we test it for real, but … I think Dr M’Benga is right in that it could significantly reduce the amount of sedative required to perform surgery on an Vulcan patient. Fewer potential side effects, too.”

“And what makes you think that?”

It’s not a trick question. He’s not annoyed. At least, not with you. Or so you hope. “I’m not sure, sir. Just an impression from the data I’ve seen.”

“Instinct.” Dr McCoy nods, and waves the padd with the not-yet-existent report. “Keep it up, Krejci.”

It’s as close to a thank you as you’re going to get. 

1450 hours. An attempt to reschedule the cancelled physicals runs into conflict with the up-coming shore leave. It takes a comm to Records and altogether too much time to sort out, especially considering nothing will happen according to any schedule, anyway. And yet. You get it sorted. Just in case.

1520 hours. Dr McCoy has Tracy run another CBC for Lieutenant Galway. Her heart rate is up now, but she’ll be in medbay for a while. He glares at the monitor with her vitals again, like it’s to blame for all of this. 

You look away.

1540 hours. You’re checking logs, making sure no one has missed anything as alpha shift nears its end. Then you get the coffee going.

1600 hours. Beta shift arrives in medbay. Dr McCoy fills in Dr M’Benga about the situation with Lieutenant Galway and the radiation leak. Everyone else talks in hushed voices. You do, too, as you update Roberta Geralu, the head beta nurse, on the melorazine. And the slightly concerning drop in Specialist Min’s Hb count, for her next physical. Mustn’t forget about that one. 

1610 hours. Dr McCoy orders alpha shift dismissed, and just like that, you’re free to spend the rest of your day in whatever way you like. 

1620 hours. You’re back in your quarters. It’s a single, which you are not, strictly speaking, entitled to despite being head nurse, but after the last batch of staff transfers, Dr McCoy talked to the quartermaster until she gave it to you anyway. 

You stretch out on the bed and attempt to clear all things medical from your mind. Today, it doesn’t work.

1645 hours. The Starfleet Technical Services Academy has always stressed the importance of physical fitness for any crewmember, no matter their assignment. It is important for medical staff, too. So you usually head to one of the gyms after your shift, and put in some exercise. You never know when the next catastrophe will hit, when you will next need to stay on your feet and alert and practising medicine and keeping records straight for hours on end without even a chance to sit down. 

1900 hours. Freshly exercised and showered, you pass the Officer’s Mess on your way to dinner. Lieutenant Uhura, the Chief Communications Officer, is beating Commander Spock at three-dimensional chess (again), to loud cheers from the various staff officers. Dr McCoy is not there. Neither is Captain Kirk. You move swiftly on.

1920 hours. Rec Room Five, the preferred option for more senior enlisted crewmembers, is brimming with people as per usual. In the far corner, you spot Tracy laughing about something with Hakim and Brent. You walk over to the replicator, to order a Caesar’s salad and a rooibos tea. You haven’t really eaten all day, you realize, except those granola bars. That’s not a habit you should get into. You resolve to eat breakfast, tomorrow.

Looking around the room again, you don’t spot anyone you’d consider talking to, such as Mikaela ( _Science, cartography_ ) or Sandy ( _Operations, cargo bay_ ), who were at the TSA with you. You could walk over to the Medical technicians, but actually, you’re too exhausted for company tonight, so you sit down at an empty table by yourself.

“Hey, Tom?” You look up wearily at Neil ( _Science, cartography_ ). You also know him from the TSA. “What’s the news from medbay with this radiation business? I hear McCoy went a bit ballistic.”

That, in itself, would not be newsworthy. Neil must know Galway, and various other crewmembers you tested today. He could be worried. And yet … You remember, when you were running the additional health and safety drills in Science in the wake of that disastrous code blue above Psi 2000, Neil happened to mention that he was opposed to “this complete waste of time.” Now, Dr McCoy’s reaction to _that_ is something you’d love to have recorded as a warning for posterity. 

“If you have a question about proceedings in medbay,” you tell Neil, with as much cheerfulness as you can muster, “I’m afraid I’m going to have to refer you to the official reports.” Those he can read, anyway. A Science technician’s security clearance is below yours. _Well_ below yours, in fact.

Neil scowls. “You’re no fun at all, Tom.”

You take that as a compliment.

“Oh, fuck off, Neil.” There’s Mikaela, after all, balancing her tray past him to sit down opposite you. “Hey, you wanna hear about that class 3 nebula we passed by today?”

You smile. “Absolutely.”

2100 hours. It is now about an hour until you should start thinking about bed. Usually, this is your time to explore one part or the other of the ship. By foot. You enjoy the walks. Tonight, you decide to pay a visit to observation deck two.

2125 hours. Observation deck two is almost deserted, as you expected. Beta shift is on duty, gamma shift is still asleep and alpha shift is about to be asleep. 

You stand, hands clasped behind your back, and look out of the viewscreen, into the black. It’s still difficult to understand, sometimes, that this is _space_ and you are _here_. You signed up for the Starfleet Technical Services Academy after the incident with Nero, as many people did; you wanted to do something that would prevent Earth from being attacked again. But you’re not a fighter, nor an explorer, nor any other kind of the heroes you associated with Starfleet when you were a child. 

When you look around the deck, you are startled to notice Dr McCoy sitting on a bench in the far corner, staring into space. Despite the fact that he hates space. Or so he always says.

What’s more, Captain Kirk is approaching the bench in this very moment.

You edge closer despite yourself, grateful for the environmental controls that cast the entire deck in low lights, and come to stand by a convenient pillar. It feels intrusive, and yet … you think about how Dr McCoy is a wound-up coil of constant tension and that Captain Kirk is the only one who can absorb that tension when it snaps, and make him relax, if only by a fraction. 

Captain Kirk clears his throat. “Since when do you want to be reminded that we’re on a tin can floating through the void?” 

Dr McCoy doesn’t look up. “Maybe I didn’t want to be found.”

“You do in fact know that the computer can locate any crewmember at any moment to within three feet, right?”

Which was rather helpful for today’s radiation business. And yet, of course, Dr McCoy snaps, “Damn surveillance technology, is what that is! I never got why —”

“Bones.”

Even from the distance, you can see the fight that goes through Dr McCoy’s body before he does look up. “What.”

“Can I?” 

“Your ship, ain’t it.”

Captain Kirk gives up, and sits down. “You get it, though, right? Why I had to have someone check that soil sample? From a Command point of view?”

Dr McCoy huffs. “And you get why I had to disagree. From a Medical point of view.”

It must be hard, for both of them, to serve together. Dr McCoy might be the Chief Medical Officer, but Medical is only one of the aspects Captain Kirk has to consider when making his decisions. An important aspect, admittedly, but it doesn’t receive the automatic win. Especially not because of who Bones is to Jim.

Not for the first time, you wonder how they do it. And perhaps more importantly, why. 

“Yes,” Captain Kirk says. “I get it.” He hesitates (you’ve never seen Captain Kirk hesitate before), then reaches out and puts his right hand on Dr McCoy’s thigh. “You had dinner?”

“Not hungry.” 

“Come to bed, then?” Captain Kirk’s husky whisper makes you shiver, as he moves his hand up, slightly, on Dr McCoy’s thigh. “Please?”

“Goddamnit, Jim.”

You stare, mesmerized by the small movement in which Dr McCoy covers Captain Kirk’s hand with his own. 

There are many theories about how long they’ve been together (almost as many theories as there are about the origin of the nickname Bones). Rumor has it they met on their very first day at the Academy, on the shuttle to the Academy, in fact. Accounts vary as to whether Dr McCoy threw up on Captain Kirk or not. Because Dr McCoy used to get motion sickness. You can hardly believe that now, after all those times you’ve seen him rooted in the middle of medbay, triaging with rapid barking orders, while the Enterprise rocks and shudders around you. A lot must have changed, in the years since that shuttle ride.

But none of that matters, because that small touch right there says _forever_. 

You still don’t know _how_ , exactly, but watching them like this, you somehow get _why_ they do it. And so you leave them, sitting there on the bench, hands touching, looking out into the endless darkness of space together.

###

**Author's Note:**

> Lieutenant Arlene Galway dies of radiation poisoning in the TOS episode “The Deadly Years” (though this was not caused by a soil sample).


End file.
